Inmate executed in Missouri

In 2005, he killed officer he blamed for brother’s death

BONNE TERRE, Mo. — A Missouri inmate convicted of ambushing and killing a St. Louis area police officer he blamed in the death of his younger brother was executed Tuesday night.

Kevin Johnson, 37, died after an injection of pentobarbital at the state prison in Bonne Terre. It was the state’s second execution this year and the 17th nationally.

Two more executions are scheduled in Missouri for the first few weeks of 2023.

Johnson’s attorneys didn’t deny that he killed officer William McEntee in 2005, but contended he was sentenced to death in part because he is Black. The courts and Republican Gov. Mike Parson declined to stop the execution.

Johnson declined to make a final statement before the lethal drug was administered.

In a first for modern executions in Missouri, Johnson was not in the execution room alone. His spiritual adviser, the Rev. Darryl Gray, sat at his side. The men spoke softly until the drug was administered.

Gray read from the Bible as Johnson shut his eyes. Within seconds, all movement ceased.

“We read Scripture and had a word of prayer,” Gray, a St. Louis activist, said. “He apologized to the victim’s family. He apologized to his family. He said he was looking forward to seeing his baby brother.”

McEntee, 43, was a 20-year veteran of the Police Department in Kirkwood, a St. Louis suburb. He was among the officers sent to Johnson’s home on July 5, 2005, to serve a warrant for his arrest.

Johnson saw officers arrive and awoke his 12-year-old brother, Joseph Long, who ran to a house next door. Once there, the boy, who suffered from a congenital heart defect, collapsed and began having a seizure.

Johnson testified at trial that McEntee kept his mother from entering the house to aid his brother, who died a short time later at a hospital.

That evening, McEntee returned to the neighborhood to check on unrelated reports of fireworks being shot off.

A court filing from the Missouri attorney general’s office said McEntee was in his car questioning three children when Johnson shot him through the open passenger-side window. A teenager was struck but survived. Johnson then took McEntee’s gun.

The filing stated Johnson returned to the shooting scene and found McEntee alive, on his knees near the patrol car. Johnson shot McEntee in the back and head, killing him.

McEntee’s wife, Mary McEntee, read a statement after Tuesday’s execution that said Johnson acted as “judge, juror and executioner” in killing her husband.

“Bill was killed on his hands and knees in front of strangers, the people he dedicated his life to,” Mary McEntee said.

Johnson’s 19-year-old daughter, Khorry Ramey, had sought to witness the execution, but a state law prohibits anyone under 21 from observing the process. Courts declined to step in on Ramey’s behalf.